Ignoring the coldness of her greeting, he took a seat close at her side, and pouring out a perfect torrent of protestations of admiration and love, repeated the offer of his hand and heart.
Lifting her head proudly, and looking him full in the eye, “Colonel Bangs,” she said, “how often must I repeat my refusal before you will receive it as final?”
“Forever!” he cried, his eyes flashing with anger. “I tell you, girl, I will never give you up; marry me you shall! I have you in my power, and you cannot escape me. I should much prefer to have you a willing bride, but—I’ll even take you against your will rather than not have you at all.”
Miriam rose from her chair and stepped back a pace or two; then confronting him with pale but dauntless face, “What right have you to address such language to me, sir?” she asked, in freezing, haughty tones, holding her head proudly erect and gazing unflinchingly into his eyes. “I am a free woman, living in a free land, and no one can compel me to marry against my inclination.”
“Even a free woman may find the compelling force of circumstances too strong for her,” he retorted; “and I think it will be so in your case, for only by consenting to become my wife can you save yourself and those nearest and dearest to you from being turned out homeless into the world.”
She had grown very pale while he spoke, but she answered in firm, though gentle tones, and with the same dauntless air with which she had replied to him at first, “To do as you wish would be a sin, because to love, honor, or respect you would be impossible to me. I utterly refuse compliance, and putting my trust in God, my father’s God, I defy you to do your worst!”
“And I’ll do it. I’ll take steps for the foreclosing of that mortgage before I’m a day older,” he said, in low tones of concentrated fury, as he rose and bowed himself out.
Turning on the threshold, “How happy you will feel when you have to leave this beautiful place, the comfortable home and the farm that has been your means of support! How you will enjoy the distress of your aged grandmother and the little orphan brother and sister, knowing you could have spared them all their pain and suffering!”
An expression of anguish swept over her features, but was gone in a moment, while in a firm voice she answered, “I trust in Him of whom the Bible tells me, ‘He shall judge the poor of the people, He shall save the children of the needy, and shall break in pieces the oppressor.... He shall deliver the needy when he crieth; the poor, also, and him that hath no helper.’”
He had heard enough, and hurried away with the words ringing in his ears, while Miriam sought the privacy of her own room, to pour out her distresses and her cry for deliverance from the unrighteous and cruel man to Him who had declared Himself the “Father of the fatherless and a judge of the widows” and “the hearer and answerer of prayer.”